So how many of the athiests here are really just angry because they had deadbeat Dads?

none but all decent people are appalled at how you disgrace God and all Christians with your intolerance, bigotry and persecution towards others!

People like you drive non believers further away from God and decent people out of the church rather than risk being associated with attitudes like yours!

Anti atheism is doing so much damage to Christianity that it is in reality anti Christianity – David Manley

It takes in reality only one to make a quarrel. It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favour of vegetarianism, while the wolf remains of a different opinion. - William Ralph Inge.

Why so blind to what causes the backlash against Christianity?

ALL the other religions and atheists live in peace and are ONLY attacked by BAD Christians which causes all GOOD Christians to despair at the damage they do!

The self destruction of Christianity is underway and the only thing that can stop it is to abandon the terrible human emotions, seek to rediscover the idea of a loving god and act like it!

Posts like yours that drive people further away from God are driving you towards hell.

So who are you working for the devil or the antichrist because it sure ain't the loving god!

The hypothesis in itself makes no sense. Why would I crave security and a father figure (God) when I already have that? If we had a desire for security wouldn't it be more logical to embrace religion if a father is either dead, absent or abusive? Don't you think it is more feasible to fill the void of something absent than supplement something that is already there?

This biographical survey is far from representative or comprehensive. Vitz puts subjects into wrong categories. Hitler was a devout Roman Catholic and Voltaire and Thomas Hobbes were not religious but believed in God. He cherry picks his subjects, which means that he leaves out a lot of subjects of either category that would contradict his hypothesis.

Moreover Vitz almost completely ignores historical context. For one, it was rather common in past centuries to lose one's parents at an early age. The average life expectancy was quite a bit lower even only a hundred years ago. Secondly, 'atheist' was in Thomas Hobbes time a common moniker for someone rejecting the Church, even if they believed in God.

It seems to me that Vitz categorises anybody not believing in his particular brand of religion as atheist, whether they believe in God or not, which only shows that he is not only extremely biased in his approach but also lacks a fundamental understanding of what atheism really is.

It is not that difficult. Atheists are convinced - through lack of compelling evidence - that there is no such thing as a God. End of story.

By the way, my father and I always got along famously, still do.

Freud's work has been thoroughly discredited due to lack of supporting arguments and evidence and is regarded as pseudoscience.

"A survey of the leading intellectual defenders of Christianity over the same period confirms the hypothesis, finding few defective fathers."

That doesn't confirm anything. This guy is clearly not a scientist. A scientist would be familiar with terms like 'confirmation bias' and 'falsifiability'.

What this Vitz guy is trying to suggest is that atheists couldn't have come to their conclusion through logic and reasoning. And that's all there is to it, this doesn't have anything to do with psychology or science.

Well that doesn't make much sense in Freudian terms does it? Supposedly those who lack an adequate father figure are the ones who go searching for one - ie God. This would seem to be borne out if we look at the higher rate of divorce and single parent families among American Christians.

My dad died before I was born. He had an epileptic fit in the bath. I'm atheist and I try to help anyone I can no matter their colour, sexuality, nationality or religion.

I tend to see it more in line with Eric Berne's "Games People Play" where stimulus hunger is the motivation behind why a person would cling to old ideas that are still feeding into his hunger for attention and stimulation. Being an atheist brings the kind of attention the person seeks and is the reason for the interaction in the first place. All of those old explanations that we did or did not get enough attention when we were infants resides in what you said and expresses itself as hunger for attention more than anything else.

No, I, and many of the Atheists I know, are so because there is no God.

What is your psychological excuse for being brainwashed into superstition?

BTW:

Professor Vitz is just a fool who could not live outside of superstition. I know there are some, even in psychology and philosophy. He also blows apart his own argument by listing Hitler as atheist; as we all know, Hitler was Catholic.

Of course we should take the word of someone who converted from atheism to believing that a paranoid-schizophrenic, manic-depressive, ego-maniacal, sexist, homophobic Uber-narcissist whose message is "Love me or I'll crush you" caused humanity to be born into sin, impregnated a virgin in order to give birth to himself in order to be sacrificed to himself in order to sit beside himself in order to save the world from himself.

Atheism is for grownups.

Thank you, 'Freedom and L...'. I have noticed the exact same thing. They also glorify imperfection in general. Maybe we could go on a pedalo ride together, or you could at least check out my answers so far.

By the way, you have five thumbs down, and I've got one... :§

so how many christians are just really angry because theyre not educated enough to understand adult issues and continue to worship a fairy tale character ?

i would be mad also if i was that stupid and still couldnt spell "ATHEIST".